No exception with abortion isn’t about life to SC’s McMaster. It’s about control of women

S.C. Gov. Henry McMaster would force 10-year-olds to carry the result of their rape to term. That’s based on McMaster’s own words.

After the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, McMaster told reporters he looked “forward to the day that we don’t have any abortions in South Carolina, and we don’t need exceptions.”



He’s spoken favorably of proposals pushed by allies in the General Assembly to make South Carolina’s already-extreme anti-abortion law more so. He’s in lockstep with Jim Bopp, general counsel for the National Right to Life and author of abortion legislation being considered in South Carolina.

“As many women who have had babies as a result of rape, we would hope that she would understand the reason and ultimately the benefit of having a child,” Bopp recently told Politico.



Bopp was referencing a 10-year-old girl in Ohio who had to be taken to Indiana for an abortion.

“Unless her life was at danger, there is no exception for rape,” Bopp explained about his model legislation to Politico. “The bill does propose exceptions for rape and incest, in my model, because that is a pro-life position, but it’s not our ideal position. We don’t think, as heart wrenching as those circumstances are, we don’t think we should devalue the life of the baby because of the sins of the father.”

Shortly after Roe was overturned, South Carolina became one the most restrictive abortion states in the U.S., outlawing most abortions after six weeks – before most women realize they are pregnant. It includes rape and life-of-the-mother exceptions. But that’s not maximal enough for McMaster and Republicans. There’s little reason to believe they won’t remove the rape exception and make the life-of-the-mother exception so vague it will scare doctors away from performing abortions even when the mother’s life is threatened by the pregnancy.

It’s already happening elsewhere. There are reports out of Missouri about doctors waiting for signs of debilitating physical distress before treating women suffering ectopic pregnancies, even though such pregnancies have no chance of producing a living baby but can kill the woman. Hospitals in Texas are refusing to treat patients with severe pregnancy complications for fear of running afoul of that state’s anti-abortion law. Lupus, bowel disease and cancer patients are being denied drugs that have routinely been prescribed for millions of Americans because one of its off-label uses is to treat ectopic pregnancies. Proposals being bandied about in Columbia include tracking and punishing people who even think about helping a South Carolina resident get an abortion even in another state.

McMaster and others insist they are doing so because they value life. That’s hogwash. They are stewards of a state in which nearly a third of our counties don’t have a single OBGYN and Republicans refused to use billions of federal dollars to expand Medicaid to help poor residents – even though it’s clear that access to affordable health care is a major determinate of the abortion rate.

Preserving life isn’t their goal. State-control over a pregnant woman’s life is.

“Don’t get pregnant,” McMaster responded when asked what he’d say to women and teenagers mandated by the state to carry pregnancies to term. “If you do, there are consequences for actions.”

Already, abortion providers in South Carolina are to report women – and 10-year-old rape victims – who seek to end pregnancies that have resulted from rape or incest.

The message to girls and women of South Carolina: If the General Assembly sends McMaster a bill that doesn’t include exceptions, he’ll sign it. If you are pregnant after being raped or face dire medical complications, too bad. There are consequences for actions, remember?

Issac Bailey is a McClatchy Opinion writer based in Myrtle Beach.